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By E. J. Karges

[For reasons well known to Mining Engineers, fine grinding in the wet form is quite universal inn plants engaged in the traction of metallic values from crude ore In the processing, of non-metallic and industrial minerals, however, fine grinding in dry form is the more common method. The crude materials generally contain less moisture than required for wet grinding, and the products are usually marketed or used in the dry form, most of them as powders. To grind wet would therefore entail the addition of water and the expense for drying the product, which is not justified. This paper will concentrate on the particle size reduction or fine grinding of materials to produce a dry powder]

Jan 1, 1963

By Steven R. Pittman, Colin McCullough, Peter Galuska

"Traditionally Continuous Fiber Aluminum Matrix Composites have been fabricated using high strength fibers and high strength matrices, often commercial alloys, with the goal of producing high strength composites. However the specific role of the choice of matrix alloy on composite properties has not been well established. One way to control composite tensile strength is to use coatings to introduce a low strength interface between fiber and matrix which tends to reduce the importance of the matrix selection, but unfortunately renders the transverse strength unacceptably low. Thus using a system with strong bonding between fiber and matrix is desirable, such as an alumina fiber / aluminum alloy matrix system. In this case the transverse strength is a strong function of the matrix strength. However the longitudinal strength then depends largely on the characteristics of the matrix. The important role of the matrix is discussed using examples of alumina fibers in various aluminum alloy matrices. The key attributes are matrix constituent phases, alloy chemistry, alloy reactivity with the fiber, and matrix strength. From the understanding developed in these systems a set of design rules may be established for selecting an optimum matrix. IntroductionAluminum matrix composites (AMC's) reinforced with continuous fibers offer very attractive property gains over AI alloys, such as strength, stiffness, and fatigue resistance. These gains are magnified when specific mechanical properties are compared which make them attractive candidates for replacing steel, nickel, titanium and aluminum alloy parts in weight critical applications (1). Many systems have been tried in the past; B/AI, C/AI, SiC/AI, Si-Ti-C-O/AI and AI203/AI. Technically B/AI was a very good system but was expensive in regard to both fiber cost and fabrication and SiC/AI and C/AI systems are still plagued with reactivity problems. The Si-Ti-C-O/AI appears to be a good strength system but with lower stiffness. Until recently, the AI203/AI was a low strength system, in part due to a lack of a high strength fiber. Recently 3M introduced a high strength AI203 fiber - Nextel™ 610, which leads to high strength composites (1,2) and may also be both low cost and also compatible with less expensive casting approaches for fabrication."

Jan 1, 1996

By Milos Bila

The second half of 2008 and the first half of 2009 brought up important anniversaries. My old passport from Czechoslovakia has a stamp with date 10-10-1968 at 10:00 AM, the exact time I crossed the border between the former Czechoslovak Republic and Austria. This date has an important meaning because I could not come back to my country for the next 21 years. The 40th anniversary of Soviet led invasion, which took place on the 21st of August 2008, revealed some unknown and long time kept secret news.

Jan 1, 2010

By D. Gatzemeier

The Jewett mine is a surface mine in central Texas, producing about 8,000,000 tons/year of lignite. The mine covers 46,000 acres of land. Approximately 430 people are employed by Northwestern Resources Company and through their efforts, the Jewett Mine is one of the most productive mining operations in the country. The Jewett Mine utilizes a unique structure of staff to convert Operations Research into plans which can be implemented at the "front line" level of the Operations Team. This planning not only makes the mine cost effective and efficient, but promotes creativity in mining, which promotes ongoing research to lower the cost of mining.

Jan 1, 1993

By P. G. Mason

The Getchell property was mined for oxidized gold ore by underground and open pit methods from 1936 to 194.5, by which time known oxide ores were mined out. From 1945 until 1967 sulfide ores were mined and roasted to improve gold recovery with varying degrees of success. In J 983 FRM Minerals, Inc. purchased the property. Since then they have carried out extensive geological exploration to define the size and character of the orebody. The sulfide ore is refractory to direct cyanidation, thus considerable metallurgical testing has been necessary to develop a suitable, cost effective process for its treatment. Wright Engineercs Limited have designed and engineered a gold extraction plant, which incorporates pressure oxidation to liberate the gold and? is scheduled to be commissioned early in 1989.

Jan 1, 1989

By Lloyd W. Trevoy

Titanium and zirconium heavy minerals occur in the tailings streams from processing plants which use the hot-water extraction process for recovery of bitumen from tar sand. In a research program conducted by Syncrude Canada Limited, the crude tailings stream was upgraded to produce quality zircon and titanium mineral products. To process the tailings through conventional upgrading equipment, bitumen residues must first be removed from the mineral grains. Then, by gravity separation, fines and coarse sand grains were removed and a 71% heavy minerals concentrate was prepared which was further separated by high-tension equipment into zircon and titanium minerals concentrates. The zircon concentrate was upgraded by gravity, magnetic and high-tension cleaning to produce a high-quality 98% zircon product. The titanium minerals concentrate was separated into rutile, leucoxene and ilmenite fractions. Heavy minerals distribution in tar sand drilling core samples has been evaluated for various locations on Syncrude Lease 17, and expected annual production levels of heavy minerals have been estimated. A preliminary evaluation has been made of the potential for zircon, leucoxene and rutile production and for further upgrading of ilmenite and leucoxene to synthetic rutile for titanium dioxide pigment production.

Jan 1, 1978

By J. D. McLenegan

The purpose of this investigation was to prepare a market survey of the refractories industry in California and Nevada (referred to in subsequent paragraphs as the region), and to determine the degree of self-sufficiency and the potential capacity for anticipated growth. The report includes estimates of the total annual refractories consumption, the quantity of refractories imported into the region, the tonnage of raw materials required for their manufacture, and the resources of fire clay and high-alumina minerals in the region.

Jan 1, 1956

By J. M. Riley

A fluorometric method using morin in an alkaline-buffered chelating solution has been developed by the Bureau of Mines for determining beryllium in ores and mill products. Apparatus for measuring fluorescence intensities of the beryllium-morin reaction is described. Preparation of the sample for analysis consists essentially of digestion with sulfuric, nitric, and hydrofluoric acids, fusion of the residue with sodium carbonate and sodium borate, Solution of the melt with sulfuric acid, and proper dilution. Chemical separation of other ions is usually unnecessary. The method rave reliable beryllium determinations on samples in the 0.01- to 0.37-percent BeO range. The method is particularly applicable to low-grade beryllium ores; however, semiquantitative beryllium determinations have been made on beryl containing 12.0 percent BeO.

Jan 1, 1956

By Brian Lightfoot

Ausmelt technology is a versatile bath smelting technology with application in many waste treatment fields at low capital and operating cost. Heavy metals extracted from wastes may be recycled to mainstream use and the slags produced will be inert and suitable for use as aggregate, shotblasting grit or other applications.

Jan 1, 1994

By L. I. Kiss, S. Perron, D. Toulouse, S. Poncsák, A. Perron

Bubbles play an important role in many industrial processes. In a Hall-Heroult cell, used for aluminum production, bubbles contribute to induce flow in the cell. The induced flow is important for the thermal balance of the cell as well as for the distribution and dissolution of the alumina. The existence of the bubble layer does not have advantages only. It increases the voltage of the cell and causes deformation along the cryolite-molten aluminum interface. The role of the anode inclination in the behaviour of the bubble layer as well as in the hydrodynamics of the bath is not clearly understood. In this work, the effect of the anode inclination angle on the bubble driven flow is studied in an industrial scale air-water model. The inclination angle is varied up to 5° from the horizontal. The instantaneous flow field is captured by Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) system. The mean velocity fields were calculated by ensembleaveraging the instantaneous velocity fields measured at different time. The existence of the counter-flow in the interpolar space and the vortex in the side channel has been confirmed. Furthermore it has been observed that the effect of anode slope on the velocity field is weak.

Jan 1, 2006

By J. P. Ress

In 1903, seventeen years after mining of the Witwatersrand gold-bearing reefs started, the findings erf the Miners' Phthisis Commission (Transvaal) resulted in the initiation of measures with the object of controlling dust production. The substance of these measures was as follows: Removal of persons from places where they would be exposed to blasting fumes; use of water to suppress dust made in drilling and in other operations; supply and control of air to working-places; filtration of dusty air; and determination of the amount of the dust in the air. Broadly speaking, progress in dust control has followed these four lines with increasing success as the nature of the problem has become better known. Complete success has not, however, been achieved, partly because increasing mechanization of mining has intensified the problem and partly because the application of these measures is not infallible, being subject, in many cases, to human control. A brief summary of the development of these measures will lead to a description of present-day practice.

Jan 1, 1947

By R. L. Nyirenda

The use of ammoniacal ammonium carbonate (AAC) leaching for the treatment of carbon steelmaking EAF dust has been investigated on a laboratory scale. The experiments have been conducted on dust samples obtained from three European steelmaking companies. As received, the dusts were found to be toxic when tested according to current EPA toxicity testing procedures. Toxicity was on account of the leachability of one or more of the following elements: Ag, Hg, Pb, and Cd. Leaching experiments with concentrated AAC solution at 40 " C showed that zinc oxide present in the three dust samples, 60-80% of the total contained zinc, was rapidly solubilized. Data on the dissolution characteristics of Cd, Fe, Pb, Mg, and Mn are also presented. Toxicity tests conducted on residues of the leaching experiments found these to have leachates below past and current EPA toxicity threshold limits.

Jan 1, 1993

By Sarah Bélair, Denis Beltrami, Valérie Weigel

"Mabounié is a polymetallic deposit in Gabon containing niobium (1.2%), tantalum (0.03%), rare earth elements (REE) (1.4%) and uranium (0.03%) that are mostly carried by Pyrochlore minerals. Classical route for niobium recovery is a pyrometallurgical process that consists in pyrochlore flotation, dephosphorization of the niobium concentrate and aluminothermy to obtain ferro-niobium. Pyrochlore concentrates can also be treated by a hydrometallurgical process with a mixture of sulfuric and hydrofluoric acid leaching followed by solvent extraction to separate niobium and tantalum. However, the first process does not allow recovering REE and the second one is not environmentally friendly because of the use of HF.ERAMET is looking for new opportunities on strategic metals market and has recently developed a hydrometallurgical process for the recovery of all these metals based on a sulfuric acid treatment of the ore. After solubilisation of the valuable elements, niobium / tantalum are precipitated as a concentrate (12% w/w Nb and 0.3% w/w Ta) while REE (2.7 g L-1) and uranium (90 mg L-1) remain in solution. Nearly 90% of REE are recovered from the solution by conventional REE double salt precipitation [NaREE(SO4)2.xH2O) method but some REE still remain in solution as this method does not allow to quantitatively recover medium (Sm, Eu, Gd, Tb, Dy) and heavy (Ho, Er, Tm, Yb, Lu, Y) rare earth elements. From the different process routes studied (solvent extraction, precipitation, ionic exchange etc.), an innovative method has been developed and patented to recover REE residual concentration in solution. This is based on an aluminum removal step followed by precipitation of REE as REE phosphate concentrate (REEPO4) by phosphate addition into solution. The phosphate concentrate is then purified according to the conventional monazite treatment, i.e. caustic conversion and REE solubilisation in acidic media."

Jan 1, 2016

By Di Yang

The influence of high density (104 -105 A/cm2) electric current pulses (70 us duration) and continuous DC (~103 A/cm2) on the flow stress and ductility in tension of a high carbon steel wire were determined at 204°, 427° and 649°C. Electropulsing (100 pulses per second) with an effective current density of 100-200 A/cm2 gave a 10% enhancement in the uniform elongation of the wire at 204°C, but had no effect at 427°C and 649°C. In contrast, continuous DC either had no significant effect on the ductility or gave a decrease. The electropulsing per se decreased the flow stress only slightly at 204° and 427°C, but gave a significant decrease at 649°C. Continuous DC increased the flow stress at all three temperatures. The present results along with those by others suggest that the enhanced ductility by electropulsing and the reduction in flow stress may be further increased by raising the effective current density through increases in either the pulsing frequency, maximum current density of each pulse or pulse duration. This could conceivably increase the reduction per pass during wire drawing or the number of passes between anneals.

Jan 1, 2001

By Takeshita. Takuo

"In this work, the progress of the HDDR process is discussed mainly on the Nd-Fe-B magnet system. There are three technologies being used for the Nd-Fe-B permanent magnet production; the sintering technique, the rapid quenching annealing and the HDDR process. The HDDR process utilizes· the HDDR phenomenon, in which hydrogen absorbing intermetallic compounds go through as they are heated in hydrogen atmosphere, Hydrogenation - Decomposition Desorption - Recombination. In the HDDR process, these four steps in the HDDR phenomenon are processed by choosing suitable reaction conditions regarding to hydrogen gas pressure, temperature, rate ·of desorption and etc., and we can produce permanent magnet powders of good magnetic properties with microstructures consisting with sub-micron size crystalline grains. In the anisotropic magnet powders, the sub-micron size crystals are being mostly aligned in the crystallographic c-axis direction. Possible applications of the HDDR process to other systems are also discussed.Microstructures of the Nd-Fe-B Permanent MagnetsIt is well known that magnet properties of magnetic materials are very sensitive to their microstructures [l]. This is seen in almost all magnet materials from soft magnetic materials and hard magnetic materials to magnetic memory materials. In this regard, the production technology is very important for the control of microstructures of permanent magnets The Nd-Fe-B magnet is the most powerful permanent magnet as a practical permanent magnet, and its coercivity force is much dependant on the microstructure as is the case for other permanent magnets."

Jan 1, 2000

By D. A. Reynolds, J. D. Davis

"INTRODUDTION Investigations by the Bureau of Mines have shown that the carbonizing properties of splint and bright coals may differ greatly. In a study of 55 coal columns selected from representative coals of the Appalachian region, Sprunk and coworkers 10/ compared various chemical and physical properties of splint and associated bright coals. Carbonization tests in the Fischer retort at 932°F. (500°C.) showed that, except for bright coals of high oxygen content, the coke residue from bright coal was much more swollen and cellular than that from splint. ·with one exception, agglutinating values determined by the Bureau of Mines test, were lower for splint than for associated bright coal.Because sorting of coal in quantity is tedious and time-consuming, separate types have not been carbonized by the Bureau of Mines-American Gas Association (BM-AGA) test, which requires 85- to 200 pound charges. However, this method has been used to determine the carbonizing properties of samples 0f bed layers that are composed largely of either splint or bright coal.4/ In these earlier tests, which were made at high temperatures on layer samples from the Elkhorn bed, Letcher County, Ky., the splint coal yielded more coke than the bright coal, and this coke was slightly stronger than that from the bright coal. The cokes from samples with large proportions of bright coal were more cellular or porous, as were the low-temperature cokes obtained from carbonization of separated samples of bright coal in the Fischer retort."

Apr 1, 1944

By D. A. Salinas G., A. H. Castillejos E.

Pachuca tanks are commonly used in the hydrometallurgical industry to carry out leaching operations. The fluidynamic characteristics of the liquid phase, resulting from the injection of gas into the draft tube, are important to achieve the complete suspension of the mineral particles and has a decisive influence in the mass transfer processes occurring in this reactor. This study investigated the effect of different design and operating characteristics on the liquid velocity field. using a laboratory-scale Pachuca tank. The transparent model was filled with water, and air was injected through the bottom in the absence of mineral particles. The liquid velocities over the whole reactor were measured under several experimental conditions using particle image velocimetry (PIV). This technique allowed to obtain a very detailed picture of the liquid motion even in the draft tube, as long as bubbles were absent from the measured field of view. The experiments have shown that the liquid velocities increase with increasing the draft tube to tank diameters ratio, the distance from the conical bottom to the draft tube entrance, or the gas superficial velocity. On the other hand, an increase in the water level with respect to the draft tube outlet caused a decrease. A mathematical model, which used the no-slip model, to calculate the variation of axial effective density along the two-phase region, was found to predict liquid velocity fields which agree very satisfactory with the experimental results obtained under all the conditions studied.

Jan 1, 1999

By C. J. Hunter

Prior to the commissioning of the Sansu Sulphide Treatment Plant (STP), Ashanti Goldfields' treatment facilities were capable of producing some 700 000 ounces of gold per annum. Ore sources were underground refractory sulphides, surface oxides and old tailings dams. In order to increase the mines production to 1 million ounces per annum and to accommodate the change in ore sources as surface mining moved into fresh sulphides, a part of the strategy adopted was -the construction of a new sulphide treatment plant with a capacity to mill 2.2 million tonnes per annum and produce 400 000 ounces of gold. The STP has been designed, built and commissioned. and has been in operation since February 1994. The Plant boasts the world's largest Bio-oxidation facility which is capable of treating 790 tonnes of sulphide concentrate per day at a grade of 11.4% sulphur and is currently undergoing an expansion to increase its capacity to 1050 tonnes per day. The following sections describe the reasons for selecting the BioX® Process, the plant design, the commissioning experience and the plant performance to date.

Jan 1, 1996

By K. W. Cathrine Solem

Filtration of liquid aluminium is widely used in the industry for the removal of inclusions, and Ceramic Foam Filters (CFFs) are often the filtration media of choice. It is known that PH3 (phosphine) can be released from used phosphate bonded CFFs when in contact with water. Additionally, there is a need of an improved understanding of the thermal stability and the chemical reactivity of these types of filters, as there is limited information available in the public domain. In the present preliminary study, three CFFs, i.e. Substrate 1–3, with varying AlPO4 (aluminium phosphate) content were studied under controlled conditions. Samples of the substrates, as produced and in contact with 5N pure aluminium, were heat-treated in a vacuum induction furnace at 850 °C and 1300 °C, as well as thermally studied at 850 °C using a Differential Scanning Colorimeter connected to a Thermogravimetric Analyser (DSC-TG). All tests were performed under an inert atmosphere of argon (Ar). Mass changes of ∼0.001 % were registered for the pure substrates, and 0.003-0.10 % when in contact with aluminium. In the latter case, diffusion of P (phosphorous) from the bulk of the substrate to the interface was established to have taken place. A colour change, from white to orange/brown, was also observed at the interface, which is a clear sign that a chemical reaction has taken place. As a result, the thermal stability of the substrates can be questioned under present conditions.

By James W. Derrick

General widespread interest in fine coal cleaning circuits did not occur in the United States until the mid 1960's. Up until this period the relatively low price for which bituminous coal was sold did not justify for many operators the capital and maintenance costs associated with the beneficiation and drying of fine coal. However, with current growing interest in this area, the introduction of new types of process equipment along with modifications to existing components is occuring to maximize the recovery of coal fines. In 1973 Derrick Manufacturing Corporation introduced high frequency screening machinery into the coal industry. The first design consisted of a 4 ft. wide 18 ft. long single deck screen frame with three 100 mesh woven wire screen surfaces divided by repulping troughs for the addition of wash water. In addition, a special slotted rubber dewatering deck was installed on the discharge end of the unit to assure adequate dewatering of the screen oversize. This panel had nominal 25 mesh X 3.0" slotted openings. The machine was also equipped with a special high speed-low amplitude (3600 RPM .032" % AMP.) integral vibrator.

Jan 1, 1983